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Tuesday, 21 May 2013

Interview with Jen and Sylvia Soska, AKA The Twisted Twins.

I really cannot believe how lucky I am. I can't believe two of the biggest directors to break into the horror genre over the past 10 years, Sylvia and Jen Soska, would agree to an interview with me, never mind even reply to my messages. But I did get a reply, and I even got to ask The Soska sisters some questions about working in movies, Dead Hooker in a Trunk and American Mary. What follows is the interview in full. I hope you all enjoy this amazing opportunity I was given.

I first saw Dead Hooker in a Trunk on The Horror Channel in the UK. What did it mean getting your debut movie out to such a large audience?

S: It's the start of a life long love affair with the UK. We're pretty
smitten. The first festival screening was in the UK, the first DVD
release, and the first time on television - it's an honor to have that
kind of support for the film and the Horror Channel has always been so
kind and supportive of our work. It's wild because a lot of our biggest
support comes from the UK and it's because of the Horror Channel
audience and the Monster Pictures release of DEAD HOOKER that we were
able to reach out to so many people. I'm very grateful for the
opportunity.

J: It meant everything to us. I do have to say that the UK will always
have a big place in our hearts. When we were starting out and
struggling, the UK gave us every break. At Nia Edwards-Behi's GHOULS ON
FILM FESTIVAL, we had our very first screening for DHIAT. The support
never stopped coming from there. We go over there and the people are so
warm and welcoming. I sincerely miss the UK every day and all the
wonderful people we've met over there. Being horror fans ourselves, we
just hoped that our work would be appreciated by other fans. We overshot
it when we got the support of an entire country. And the UK Horror
Channel has never stopped. They play us all the time and we always love
to chat with them anytime we can.

Did the movie getting such a huge following change your lives in any way, and if so, how?

S: Absolutely, if we hadn't gotten the support that we did with DEAD
HOOKER, it wouldn't have been possible to make another film. We went
back to work after wrapping the first film, working long hours to pay
off the huge debt we put ourselves in, putting money back into the film
first, then still cutting and working on getting it released between
shifts. People stood by the film and got the word out. By the time that
the film went to the market, major studios had already heard about it
from the online and festival reaction. Making films was a dream of mine
and Jen's and now that's a reality, and I owe it to everyone who has
supported the films, I can never thank them enough.

J: The fans have all the power. We might not feel that way all the time,
but it's true. When we made DEAD HOOKER, we were virtually unknown
filmmakers. We were first timers that made an indie, uber low budget
film and let me tell you that that not only closes a lot of doors, but
slams them in your face. Hard. It's the fans that embraced DHIAT that
made it into the success that it has become and it's their support that
made it possible to make AMERICAN MARY. They demanded another film from
us. We'd mention AMERICAN MARY in interviews and they just went rabid
over it. It's that demand and support that's made it all possible. I'm
still blown away by our followers. They're just the best people in the
world. Everything we do we do for them. They make it possible for us to
continue to do what we do.

There is a lot of heart in your movies, and Dead hooker in a trunk is
incredibly reminiscent of exploitation movies from the seventies. Was it
a conscious decision to use exploitation movies as an influence, or is
it something that just came about whilst making the movie?

S: DEAD HOOKER started as a faux trailer that we made as a final project
and a fuck you to the film school that ripped us off and wasted our
time. It was inspired by GRINDHOUSE, that was in the theatres at the
time and was real film school. We played it as our own project at
graduation to a huge reaction which made us decide to make it into a
feature. We knew we had little to no money for the film and that it was
going to be the same people crewing as acting in the film, so the
grindhouse style really played into what we were doing and how we would
tell our story.

J: It was us winking to the camera. Indie filmmaking really lends itself
to the whole style of Grindhouse and much on the time in those films
you see filmmakers using creativity over cash to make it happen. We
never write for a budget. We write and then figure out how we're going
to pull it off.

What do you think of your (deserved) near iconic statusas horror directors after only two movies?

S: It's fucking weird. We've been working in film as actresses since we
were little girls and nothing really hit home. We started directing at
23, now we'll be thirty at the end of April and it feels like the last
seven years just flew by. I'm happy that people are enjoying the work.
We have a lot of cool stuff lined up with original scripts as well as
big screen adaptations of one of our favorite artist's work, so we
promise to keep making different cool stuff for the people who dig what
we're doing.
J: It's a massive honor. I sometimes just stare off and think about it
and can't even come close to believing it. It's a dream come true in
every way. to have so much support and influence, I feel we really owe
it to our supporters to deliver the absolutely best product possible and
always keep them guessing what we'll come up with next. In a sea of
remakes and sequels, we're very into shaking things up. We've got a lot
more in store and we're not even close to pulling off everything we want
to do. We're just getting started.

Tell us about the making of Dead Hooker in a Trunk and American Mary.

S: DEAD HOOKER was grindhouse, completely volunteer with people who
wanted to see something different get made. It was zero budget, but we
ended up spending $2500 on the film, and mainly got in debt from taking
the time off from working and having bills pile up from marketing the
film and traveling to sell it. You get in some pretty desperate times
when you start off, but if you love it, it's all worth it. We were in
every department. We would hire the actors, get the locations, set dec,
bring food, bring costumes, go through the motions of the scene, check
the footage, shoot the day, clean up the set, and go home and dump the
footage. We learned how a film exists in wearing so many hats. Then we
had MARY where we literally had the best people in the business heading
every department and making up the crew. We had limited time and a
modest budget, but with this team, it didn't matter, there wasn't
anything we couldn't do. We planned everything out meticulously,
storyboarding, and making shot lists and planning the holy hell out of
every day because we knew there would be no reshoots or ability to fix
things in post - if we didn't get our day, we would be letting everyone
down.

Both sets and both films were far more ambitious
than our means to make them, and yet, everyone came together to make
these very unique and special films.

J: The best thing about DEAD HOOKER and having that indie, DIY
background is that we really learned to roll with the punches. As soon
as a problem comes up, you need it solved and you don't have time to
stop and give it a good long think. I love martial arts and we've both
trained heavily. There's this term, "munen muso". It means the state of
mind where worries, attachments, fears,
and mundane thoughts have been purged from the mind so that the natural
intuitive mind can respond unhampered as the situation requires. That's
how you need to react. You need to just react. It has to be instinctive
and DIY filmmaking really fine tunes those reflexes.

No
two sets are alike. The problems and challenges you plan for never come
to pass. It's always something out of nowhere and often it's stuff that
is just so insane you couldn't even fathom it. I do have to say it was
outstanding to be surrounded with such an experienced crew. They were
all masters of their fields and I cannot say enough good things about
them. They are the reason that AMERICAN MARY was even possible. Without
even one of them it would not have been possible. Everyone went above
and beyond to make it happen, many of which volunteered their time or
put their own money in to help out. The love that they put into the film
just pours from every frame and I cannot wait to bring them together
again on the next one. It was a huge learning curve from running around
with a camera and now having this incredible force behind you.

How did the experience differ on each movie?

S: Having a team and a budget means you can put your focus where it
needs to be, on the film, its look, the story, and the performances.
MARY was meticulous, HOOKER was whimsical. Both films had one thing in
common, no one was there for the money. Everyone who came out and worked
on the film worked on it because they loved the stories and wanted to
make sure they came out right. I think that's what makes the films
special because you can see that dedication from the team in every
frame. I love my team so much - I'm dying to get back to work so we can
be reunited.

J: Every film is different. You learn from each one and obviously take
your lessons and found wisdom with you, but every time it's like the
first time. Having an army behind us in MARY was the biggest difference.
It felt like being an Avenger with SHIELD behind me, ha ha. Actually,
that's a very accurate way to describe it.

Unbelievably you had people complain about the title of your first film. How do you feel about this, and how do you feel about censorship in general?

S: I didn't expect it because it's a satire. It would be ludicrous
to give a film that title and not have some sort of socially responsible
commentary to how we treat prostitutes and how they are constantly
murdered with little to no effort put into bringing their murderers to
justice. We live in Vancouver where the Pickton Killer was at large in
2007 and the police were remarkably unaffective in bringing him to
justice. In our film, there is a commentary on that, the police are
useless in the film, and this younger generation of people who are in no
way unflawed decide to put this dead body they find to rest. The
violence in the film is cartoonish, until the Hooker's death scenario
where the film takes a decidedly darker tone as she is taken apart for
two song lengths. We didn't create the term 'dead hooker in a trunk',
it's a joke. But we didn't want the title character to go on through the
film unhumanized. Yet, the title of the film kept many festivals from
even viewing it, and got it banned in Saskatoon with HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN
and THE TAINT because it is far easier to hold artists on trial for
their films than seek out true justice in real world matters and horror
has always been an easy scapegoat.

It's a misappropriation of time and effort to focus
changing the world by censoring art. We have a ratings board, if you, as
an adult, do not wish to see a film, don't see it. But taking away
something that you don't enjoy watching from those who would doesn't
make sense to me. Society is only strengthened by a free flow of ideas.
We can't villainize people for thinking different from us, even if we
don't agree with something, diversity is important to our culture. A lot
of censorship is done for the wrong reasons and hurts artists, but I
was amazed at the outpour of support we received around the world when
our film was banned. It's good to see that people won't put up with that
shit.

J: Sylv said it perfectly. It plays into the theme of AMERICAN MARY and
our tagline. Appearances are everything. People are so judge~y. You make
assumptions and jump to conclusions you're going to reveal your
ignorance. You can't judge a book by its cover, a film by its title, or a
person by the way they look.

Censorship breeds ignorance. The world is indeed a beautiful place
and life is a gift to be cherished, but that doesn't mean that there are
some unspeakable horrors in this world. Art imitates life. As artists,
we should be saying something with our work and at times that means we
have to turn a mirror on the world and expose its darkness. Censorship
just throws a big blanket over the horrors of life and the world and
says, "if we don't see it, it doesn't exist." We need to be active in
making the world a better place rather then hiding the bad parts away.
It becomes an elephant in the room. Just because we don't talk about it,
doesn't make it go away. The shitty parts of life and the horrendous
acts that are committed across the world need to be exposed and we need
to have a dialogue about it. I'm appalled when a film comes out and the
filmmaker is blamed for the acts in the film. Films are make believe,
they are saying something about the acts that are depicted in them. We
should all strive to think for ourselves and be informed adults. More
so, I find it disturbing how much children are sheltered these days.
Kids have more access to information than ever before and we are in no
way depriving our kids of a childhood by making them informed. Kids are
all different, albeit, and capable at different ages dependent on the
individual of being able to understand complex ideas. If parents don't
educate their kids about mature content, they will get their education
somewhere else and I feel it's a parents responsibility to be the ones
to teach their children and answer their questions. Even the hard ones.

The premise of both of your movies have been incredibly intelligent and original. Is intelligent and original filmmaking something you both want to bring back to horror?

S: When Jen and I grew up watching horror, falling in love with the
genre, the stories were original and intelligent. Now the technology of
making a film, how a film is made had overshadowed the story that is
being told, hence the onslaught of remakes and paint-by-numbers
unoriginal horror. It's gotten to an almost depressing point where the
word horror is synonymous with 'crap' because that's what the studios
are pumping out at an alarming rate. Fads go in cycles, I think a lot of
fans are bored by the films being made and they are fighting back with
original storytelling. I'm hoping that becomes the new fad and we can
see a brilliant new age for horror films coming to life. I hope with the
success we've seen with our films, it makes studios and distributors
seek out the storytellers that are out there.

J: Horror should be intelligent. It should have a reason to exist that's
more than just for the sake of making a film. It should be artful. We
forget that in the sea of "paint by numbers" horror. You see a lot of
that in North American horror. Horror here has become like this dirty
word. SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, THE THING, DEAD RINGERS, THE SHINING....
there have been so many clever, haunting, beautifully done horror
movies, but somewhere along the line they just started to be about blood
and boobs. I'm clearly not against either, but either being used for
pure shock value and without substance is just a waste. There is still
intelligence and originality in horror, but you have to look
internationally or independently. I SAW THE DEVIL, REC, LET ME IN,
AUDITION... there have been so many incredible international films.
Independents like MANBORG, PONTYPOOL, SPLINTER, DONKEY PUNCH, GRAVE
ENCOUNTERS, THE LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT OF ROSALIND LEIGH... they're
just amazing! But you have to hunt to find them because they don't have
the millions to market themselves like the latest big Hollywood piece of
shit. I hope we are even a small part of bringing originality and
intellect back into fashion in the horror scene.

Could you both tell us your influences in movies, and perhaps list some of your favorite genre films?

J: Oh! EVERYONE and everything Sylvie just mentioned! I'd add GRAVE
ENCOUNTERS, THE LAST WILL AND TESTAMENT OF ROSALIND LEIGH, DEAD
RINGERS, REC, and Joss Whedon. He's a huge influence on us. And it's my
list so he totally counts, especially with how he redefined the final
girl in BUFFY. Stephen King, but I imagine that one's fairly obvious.
Anne Rice and her vampire chronicles were what we had instead of
TWILIGHT. I wish those books got the attention that TWILIGHT has.
They're infinitely better in every way.

Why do you think women have such trouble getting recognized in horror circles? Are they not taken as seriously as male filmmakers?

S: I think there are many misconceptions on who likes horror, who works
in the genre, and who the audience is. Women have been a part of horror
filmmaking since Alice Guy was the first director of fictional cinema
and went on to work on over 700 productions, creating the Solax Film
Company on the east coast, the biggest film organization that rivaled
the west coast's Hollywood. It is a predominantly male industry, at
least in the regards to people who get the recognition and celebration
of their works, that's why I am honored to be a part of Women In Horror
Recognition Month that focuses on female artists throughout history and
their contributions to the genre. I've met misogynistic assholes while
working in film, but I've also met them while working at Starbucks,
there's a lot of them in the world but thankfully like many dinosaurs,
they are dying off and replaced by forward-thinking humans that are more
interested in individual merit than genitals. From my experience, men
and women are excited to have more female artists getting recognition in
the genre, more on unique story telling and work than just being female
artists. There's a trend of support for one another, Jen and I have met
heroes from the genre and the well known male horror icons have been
very welcoming and supportive of us and our work.

J: I am happy to say that every male director and writer we've met has
fully welcomed us into the boys club. I think there are still real
assholes out there and I've met and worked with my fair share, but they
are dying out and no one wants to work with someone who is a poison. And
that's what these misogynistic pricks are. A disease that poisons and
destroys everything they touch. This business can attract monsters.
People that get easy access to hopeful young people that are desperate
to make their dreams a reality and most of these hopefuls make easy
prey. It's not everyone, but everyone should be aware they're out there.
It's why the horror stories exist. They ultimately do reveal themselves
and after you meet a few, they're easy to recognize. They're just
miserable human beings and you can't let your experiences and encounters
with them put you off. They're a dying breed.

What do you find harder? The film making, or the tireless promotion you both seem to put yourselves through after the film is made?

S: Because of the way we started in this industry with being with a film
from concept to execution to final distribution and everything in
between, we know our commitment to a film is a matter of years. Our
focus is on the films before anything else and you have to make a lot of
personal sacrifices in order to really prevail in such a career, but
it's also one of the most rewarding experiences even with all the
challenges, so it feels like work but it's so second nature to us at
this point. I love what I do, I'm blessed to have these opportunities.
All of it is exhausting to some extent, but I'm very mathematical and
looking at the big picture. Creating a film is exciting, it's
invigorating even though there is little sleep, high stress, and even
higher stakes. Non-stop travel for work can be physically exhausting,
but getting to meet the people who have supported you in the flesh and
sharing stories and experiences - that's a reason why you make films in
the first process. The only hard part of anything is when you don't have
everyone on the same page, you work five times harder with a bad
partner than a good one and I'm lucky that I was born with a phenomenal
partner for all this craziness.

J: I love both and I am so lucky to have had the opportunity to travel
so much and connect with the people who make it all possible, our fans.
Both come with their hardships. Making a film is dependent on who you
work with. Always surround yourself with good people. Ask around.
Always. If you don't know someone, ask around and take heed of any
horror stories. Again, they exist for a reason. You work so much harder
with bad partners. Avoid them at all costs. Making a film should never
be just a battle, but it happens. I'd say the promotion can be hard
because we never turn down a chance to promote or connect with people.
We can get pretty exhausted, but I have such an amazing support in Sylv.
I don't have to face any challenge alone or embark on any adventure
alone. I don't know what I'd do without her. She's always there for me
and we can easily continue to divide and conquer together.

How did you both get into filmmaking?

S: Unintentionally. We have been acting since we were seven, nothing
exciting ever came of it. Our resume was filled with stereotypical twin
roles, so we decided to try our hand at stunt work because of our
extensive martial arts background. That led us to an excellent
outsourced stunt portion in something that was not the film school it
advertised itself as being. It was the final straw in a line of industry
disappointments. When the funding for our final project got cut, we
decided to make a final project that we directed, wrote, acted in, did
the stunt work for, and crewed just to make something that we wanted to
see get made. It started as a fake trailer and became a feature. We just
wanted to see it through, so we dedicated all of our time and resources
into it. Five years later, it has toured the festival circuit, gotten a
limited theatrical, been released on DVD, and has had its television
premiere. We wrote more scripts and kept our focus of creating a career
for ourselves.

J: I honestly didn't realize it was an option. All of our life
experiences and odd jobs and weird skills that never seemed to go
together. It all fell into place when we found filmmaking. It felt like
it was a path we were on long before we even realized it.

Do you have an agenda/ethos with your movies?

S: There is a reason why the film exists, more so than I just want to
make a film. It needs to have a philosophy, reason to exist, some sort
of commentary on something in order for me to have a passion to make it.
You are with your films for a very long time, there are years of a very
strong focus on each film and then it becomes a part of your life -
it's important for there to be something more there that you're
dedicated all that time and effort into.

J: We like to make people think. We want people to feel something when
they watch our films and take something away from it. You know that
feeling when you leave a film and you just have this film watching after
glow? I LOVE that! I want to make that happen. I love when you can sit
down and grab a coffee and pastry and just chat about what you just saw.
It's what every film should aim to do. In too many films and
entertainment, the audience is told how to react and what to think. They
throw in utterly useless laugh tracks into everything. I want our work
to inspire thought. I think good art is interpretive. It should be in
the eye of the beholder. It also means that our audiences either
passionately love or hate our work, but that's okay. At least there's
passion and feeling there.

Can you tell us about how the story of American Mary, and your interest in body modification came about?

S: We stumbled upon, unbeknownst to us at the time, an April Fool's
prank that featured two identical twin brothers who had swapped limbs in
an extreme body modification procedure. Along with a photo diary, there
was a story from the brothers that accompanied it that said you would
have to be an identical twin to understand why they would want to do
this. It scared me. My mother taught us from a young age that if
something scares you, it's because you have a lack of knowledge about
the subject. So, we studied it. Our fear turned to fascination, to
admiration. Here was a group of people focused on self expression who
are one of the most villainized and misunderstood groups out there. We
wanted to have them reintroduced to the world in a film that focuses on
the people they are and not the monsters that the media would witch
hunt.

J: It had been such a long time interest of ours. I never even imagined
we'd end up making a film with such heavy body mod influences all over
it, but it was a really big part of the story we wanted to tell.

Was it hard finding the right actress to portray Mary?

S: We wrote the part for Katie. We had been fans since GINGER SNAPS and
continued to watch her career, but were frustrated to have our favorite
actress not in more multi-dimensional interesting roles because she is
so talented. It might sound cruel considering the film, but everything
that happens in AMERICAN MARY was something we wanted to see Katie do
and knew she would be killer in.

J: We never write for anyone and we knew how important and vital to the
film the role of Mary was. We wrote it for Katie and never even
considered what we'd do if she turned it down. We'd long been in love
with Katie as an actress. She has this outstanding depth and maturity to
her work. She can convey so much emotion with such subtlety. She walks
into a room and you notice. She just has this indescribable quality to
her. Either you have it or you don't and she has it in spades. I just
love her. We're far from through working together.

What were the advantages/disadvantages of having two writers/directors on set?

S: Jen is awesome, so it's an advantage. Having to deal with me is
probably a huge disadvantage for her. We're born collaborators, so we've
always tried to work together, we do well as a team, we're a unified
front even though our personalities are vastly different, we share the
same passions. We're so close that it really is like having the same
person in two different bodies. Nothing would be more confusing than
having two directors that look the same that are saying two different
things, but we're so on the same page that it rarely happens. If we do
disagree, we simply talk it out and come up with a solution, but we
pre-plan everything extensively so it is rare.

J: I imagine if you have two people with contradicting ideas, it can be
very difficult having them both on set, but Sylv and I have a very
definite vision. We're two very different people and take very different
paths to get to the same destination, but we are unified on set. We've
never had the luxury of time, you never really do, so we have to be one
about everything.

Can you tell us what you are working on next?

S: We have an original monster film called BOB that puts the focus on
practical effects being a part of the story telling process. The tagline
is: There's a monster inside all of us, sometimes it gets out. We are
very lucky to have had the support that we have with MARY, so a lot of
very cool opportunities have been presented to us. We're going to be
very busy for the next few years.

J: We've got quite a few projects on the way and were recently announced
in the incredible line up of talent on THE ABCs OF DEATH 2, but we
can't talk about any of it just yet. For now, our crimson lips are
sealed, but like with everything, when we can make some announcements, we
will and they'll be loud ;)

Many thanks for answering these questions. I feel incredibly proud to have interviewed such talented people as yourselves.

S: Thank you for accommodating our crazy schedule and taking the time to chat with us!

J: No way, thank YOU, Dani!! You are fucking awesome. We're so happy to chat with you! Anytime :)

Awesome interview! The Soska sisters are bad ass and I've been wanting to message them about an interview but never gotten around to it. Probably because I can't think of any awesome questions. ;) Did you email them the questions or do the interview over I.M.?